Changing the Days
by Everlark Pearl
Summary: Written for Prompts in Panem Round 3: Day 1 - Peeta smuggles a gift into the Victor's Village for Haymitch, even if he doesn't condone it. Visual Prompt: Haymitch's Liquor


The path of well-trodden snow that leads back to the Victor's Village crunches underfoot as I walk. Despite the relentless cold and frozen remains of a winter that doesn't seem ready to wane, plenty of residents are out today.

I nod briskly as I pass the familiar faces that I am used to seeing every day, but I don't keep eye contact long enough to allow them to give me the questioning looks I know they want to. Looks that seem to say, _"We don't see you much, anymore."_

There isn't a look I could possibly give them in return to explain why it has only been Katniss going to the school to pick the kids up every afternoon. In a District as small as Twelve, there will always be chatter, and while Katniss is quick to remind me that it's nobody's business, I can't help but wonder what the gossip has manifested itself into as a result of our silence. The thought of it unsettles me, but this is how he wants it.

The smile I offer the day nurse on her way out of the house is weak and forced, and I pull my coat around my body tighter as I pass her, hoping she doesn't suspect anything. Surely she wouldn't approve of the contraband shoved in my breast pocket.

Ever since the day Katniss got too anxious to sit around and started cleaning everything in this house from top to bottom before I got back from the bakery, it hasn't felt the same. I'm used to hearing empty bottles clink together when I push open the heavy front door, while the pungent odor of stale liquor assaulted my senses. Now, the door is just as quiet as ours, and the house as a whole smells like the hospital ward in The Capitol, a smell I still can't seem to forget after all these years.

Katniss meets me at the bottom of the staircase and sighs while pulling her hand through the dark, disheveled tresses that frame her face. Her eyes are puffy and red, and it's obvious she has been crying — I got here just in time.

"He's still awake right now, but I had to get out of there," Katniss whispers, her voice cracking near the end.

I nod in understanding, ghosting my hand up to rub the soft, green wool the covers her shoulder, wishing that there was something I could say or do to fix these last few months, but there's nothing.

Katniss stands up on her tiptoes and presses a tender kiss to my lips, clutching my hand and curling her fingers through mine.

"You better get going, school lets out soon." I help Katniss into her coat, eager to give her a break from this for another day but sad that I am missing another afternoon with my children. Even though they understand, I can't help but focus on all of the time I'm missing, especially right now.

"They'll be waiting for you to tuck them into bed tonight," Katniss soothes, rubbing my arm as though she senses my distress.

"I'll be there," I whisper assuredly.

For a split second, I contemplate going with her. I miss seeing the smile on my children's faces when they spot me and Katniss waiting for them outside of school. It has been months since I've sat down with them and listened to them tell us about their day. I want that again, and I hate myself for wishing this was over sometimes, but I'm ready to have my life back to what it was.

Then I remember that my life will never be what it was, especially when this is over. None of our lives will.

Since Haymitch fell ill several months ago, our family has been turned upside down. It started off slowly with daily visits with the kids while Haymitch barked angrily about doctors and nurses poking and prodding at him.

It didn't take him long to start refusing medical help, though I'm surprised he put up with it as long as he did. He began to deteriorate fast after that, and only started allowing nurses to stop by and stay when he realized that the pain was too much to handle and we had taken his liquor away.

He gets through the days now in morphling hazes and is only lucid for short periods of time. I've overheard the nurses talking, and they know it'll be soon. The things they've described to each other while catching each other up on Haymitch's condition sound horrific at best, and I know that there is no way Katniss and I would have been able to help Haymitch like we were originally planning to.

Now, we come here in shifts and sit with him. I usually stay longer than Katniss does, but we've both had days where we couldn't be here at all. The kids ask about him all the time. It's not easy to explain to them why we don't want them to see him like this. We don't want to see him like this. As Haymitch got sicker, the decision to keep the kids away was an easy one. They're too young for nightmares of their own.

"Well, look who's here," Haymitch utters after I push open the bedroom door.

The thick, white curtains that are usually tightly shut are open today, and the sunlight that pours in as a result seems to call explicit attention to just how gaunt Haymitch has become.

"Just another day," I reply, my voice monotone.

"I made your wife cry today, I'm sorry." He tries to force a signature, sarcastic chuckle, but instead falls into a coughing fit. I hand him a handful of tissue and look away as he continues to hack into them, struggling more and more to catch his breath with each whoop.

My eyes land on the two cards on his bedside table and I smile at the familiar designs of my children. A drawing of an exceptionally large sunshine and flowers from my daughter, and a far more subtle drawing of the fireplace in Haymitch's living room from my son, each with the words _"Get well soon, Uncle Haymitch"_ scrawled on the front. A pit forms in my stomach when I read the words. They know he'll never get well.

"Now why'd you have to do that?" I ask Haymitch once he's stopped coughing.

"All I did," he says slowly, still struggling to catch his breath, "was tell her that her sweater.. was the same shade of green as my skin."

I shake my head and cringe as his crassness, contemplating whether or not it's wise to present Haymitch with the gift I snuck in for him after the coughing fit I just heard. In the end, I find myself reaching inside my jacket and pulling out the bottle of liquor anyway, holding it up at eye level so Haymitch can see it.

Normally, I wouldn't condone something like this, and I know if Katniss found out what I did, she'd be angry with me. She seems to still believe that if Haymitch listens to the nurses, rests, and never takes another sip of alcohol that somehow it will reverse the damage to his liver overnight that he caused himself over decades. It's too late for that now — the damage is done. What's wrong with giving this to a dying man?

He takes the bottle from my hand and clutches it as tightly as he can manage, dropping his arm onto the bed next to him.

"Do you want me to open it for you?" I ask, stepping closer to the bed.

"No." He shakes his head and closes his eyes. "That day nurse pumped me full of morphling before she left. I want to enjoy it, not kill myself. Tomorrow."

I nod, even though Haymitch can't see it with his eyes closed, then sit down in the overly comfortable brown chair that Katniss and I have been occupying during our visits. Just when I think the morphling has pulled Haymitch under for the remainder of the day, I hear him grunt and clear his throat.

"Thank you," he says through dry, cracked lips.

"No need to thank me, it's just liquor."

"No, not for the liquor." With his eyes still closed, he takes a deep breath. "You and Katniss…" The use of Katniss's name tells me that he has something important to say, and I wait patiently for him to continue. "You didn't have to keep me around, but you did."

"We didn't keep you around, that's just the morphling talking," I argue, but fall silent when Haymitch lifts his hand to attempt to stop me.

"You two made me part of your life when it's the last thing either of you should have done." I want to continue to argue with him. I want to tell him that I can't imagine going through these years without him in our lives, but I don't. "I'm proud of you two, you know."

"I know," I murmur, dropping my head into my hands.

"And those kids," he says, his voice growing stronger at the mention of them. I'm glad his eyes are still closed. I don't want him to know that he is on the verge of making another person cry today. "They're incredible."

"I know," I repeat, doing everything in my power to keep my voice steady. "They miss you so much."

"I miss them, too," Haymitch admits quietly. Maybe it wouldn't hurt to bring them around to see him again, just for a few minutes when he's not in pain and seconds away from drifting off to sleep. Getting Katniss to agree to it was going to be a problem, though. "They need you more than I do. You should be with them."

"I'll go home as soon as the night nurse gets here," I promise.

"No, go now," Haymitch insists, his voice fading. "Don't waste any more time on me."

I stay seated for several minutes, waiting for Haymitch to speak again, but he doesn't. Then I notice his deep, rhythmic breathing and realize that this time, he actually is asleep, finally pulled under by the strength of the morphling.

Rising from my seat, I take one last look at the cards on the bedside table before grabbing the bottle of liquor that Haymitch still holds in his hand. I shove it under the bed, determined to keep it a secret from everyone so that Haymitch can get one last sip in a rare moment that his blood is free of drugs.

I don't leave. I can't bring myself to do it until the night nurse gets here. I waste time in his kitchen, sweeping up dust that has accumulated in the corners, understanding now why Katniss felt compelled to clean the entire place. He has probably tried to get her to leave him, too.

There may have been a time, years ago, when I could have left, not caring that he was sick and alone. Back when the flashbacks were still so strong and so often that the bitter feelings would force me to remember how Haymitch left me once, but that was a long time ago.

Eventually, the night nurse arrives, and I slip out the front door quietly after telling her that Haymitch has been asleep for hours now. As I step out onto the front porch, I wonder if I did a good enough job to ensure nobody finds that bottle of liquor.

The temperature outside has dropped at least ten degrees since I was last out here, all evidence of resident activity stifled by the darkness, and the house is just as quiet when I walk inside.

I sit with my children a little longer than usual tonight, giving them each an extra kiss on their foreheads before I finally leave their rooms, and when I slip into bed with Katniss and her body curls into mine, I hold her a little tighter against my chest than I normally do.

If I knew it was going to be the last time either of us would see Haymitch alive, I would have done things differently. I would have left when he told me to. I would have gotten the kids and brought them back with me to see him one last time. I would have opened that bottle of liquor and let him have one final sip, but it's too late for any of that, now. It'll never be the same again.

Weeks later, while sitting out on the porch enjoying the warmth that has finally made its way into the district, I momentarily forget that Haymitch is gone and I find myself walking toward his house to say hello as I always did. It's not until I try to open the door and find it locked that I remember.

That night, after the kids have gone to bed and Katniss and I retreat to the kitchen, not ready to sleep ourselves, I reach into the cupboard and pull out the sealed bottle of liquor I brought to Haymitch all those weeks ago.

Katniss looks at me confused when I set it between us at the table.

"I smuggled this into his house for him," I confess, not meeting Katniss's eyes. "But he never got to drink it."

I look up and see the unreadable expression on her face. It's too late to be angry, too soon to laugh.

"Want some?" I offer grabbing for the bottle.

This time, Katniss's face contorts into a scowl at my question. She eyes the bottle of clear liquid in my hands as I twist the lid, breaking the seal. She watches as I take a long pull from the bottle and set it back down on the table then wipe my mouth with the back of my hand.

I feel the bottle being pulled from my hands before I actually see that Katniss is leaning over the table. She takes a swig and wipes her mouth before setting the bottle back in between us on the table.

"For Haymitch," she says, a sad smirk playing on her lips.

I laugh lightly at the dedication and nod, screwing the cap back onto the bottle.

"For Haymitch."


End file.
